[karz4life87]

Has anyone painted the factory front grille with the chrome insert? I want to go to white all around. Any help would be great. Its a 04 silverado.

 

[hmccall3]

Has anyone painted the factory front grille with the chrome insert? I want to go to white all around. Any help would be great. Its a 04 silverado.

I painted mine on my 01 Silvy. Mu truck is black with a lot of chrome, including a billet grill insert. I decided to black out the entire front as the billet was getting kinda dull.

1st thing I did wad remove the grille completely and power washed it front and back. If you dont have a power washer you can use a stream sprayer on your water hose. I let it dry and removed my billet inserts to paint separately.
Then use some 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper to de-gloss the areas you'll be painting. It doesn't take much sanding, you just want to "rough up" the surface a bit. I then have the whole grille a rub down with denatured alcohol to remove any dust and oils left over.

Mask off any areas that aren't going to be painted, then spray the grille with adhesion promoter following the directions on the can. This will really help the paint stick and help prevent chipping and peeling. After that I used Krylon Fusion gray primer in several light coats. After the 4th coat I lightly sanded the primer with 2000 grit wet/dry sandpaper before applying the finish coat.

For the finish coat I used Krylon Fusion gloss black, also in several light coats about 3 minutes apart. I let the grille dry overnight, then applied Krylon high gloss clear coat. What I have found works best on the clear coat is 2-3 light coats about 5 minutes apart, then wait about 10 minutes and apply a heavy "wet" coat. After that don't do anything else to it, move it or anything for at least 1 hour. Although the clear coat dries in about 10 minutes, give it the extra time to harden a bit, which it will continue to do for about 10 days.

Hope this helps!

 

[karz4life87]

hmcall thank you for all the info. That should be a great help. Ill let you know how it goes. thanks again

 

[Jimmeh]

Yup. I painted mine. I did basically what hmccall did also. Here's a couple of pics of it done and on the truck:

It did look like this:

 

[karz4life87]

liking the look of it, however i want the chrome insert piece all white as well. Im not a huge fan of chrome, ive been getting it off my truck since the day i bought it. haha

 

[Jimmeh]

Yeah, I've been thinking of painting that part too, but we'll see how it looks after I do a couple of other things. My original plan was to have my bumper, wheels, and grille thing all chrome, but that always changes, lol.

 

[karz4life87]

lol yea i know what you mean. But im looking to go more with the black and white theme. Black wheels, Black grille, rest of it in white. Im looking to get i t painted a nice perl white.

 

[b-radical]

im thinking of goin "storm trooper" with my truck too. White body, black everything else. what would you guys recommend for the chrome bumper. I would like to avoid painting the chrome bumpers. do the z71 tahoes come with a plastic cover for the bumpers? i think i've seen something like that.
@jimmeh i noticed you have the brute force AEM intake with a k&N cone filter. whats up with that? Is the AEM filter no good?

 

[karz4life87]

I am actually looking at getting the SS front bumper. Theres a company out here in colorado that sells them brand new ready for paint for $76 and getting it painted once i get the truck painted. i love the storm trooper look. I also got some blue for a little bit of accent lighting and the bow ties are going a nice blue as well.

 

[groceryman]

I took my billet grille insert out and painted my grille black wanting to go all black with just a little chrome. Now thinking about painting the insert black

 

[Jimmeh]

@jimmeh i noticed you have the brute force AEM intake with a k&N cone filter. whats up with that? Is the AEM filter no good?

I have no idea. I bought the intake off a friend of mine who had the K&N filter on it when I bought it. The intake itself is a waste of money, but I only paid about $50 for the whole setup. I actually put my stock airbox back in and am just running the intake tube off of it. I'll probably end up getting another filter later on, but right now I'm not too worried about the power of the truck, lol.

I should also add that I have a tune on my truck for the CAI, but it still hasn't gotten me much for numbers on the dyno at my friends house. I think I'll be happier with just a programmer with a power tune then the setup I have now.

---------- Post added at 06:21 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:19 PM ----------

I am actually looking at getting the SS front bumper. Theres a company out here in colorado that sells them brand new ready for paint for $76 and getting it painted once i get the truck painted. i love the storm trooper look. I also got some blue for a little bit of accent lighting and the bow ties are going a nice blue as well.

What's the companies name?

 

[karz4life87]

Its called Cert-I-Fit Auto body Parts. I have bought several pieces from them over the years and never had a problem with fitment. Jimmeh shoo me a PM and can give you specifics if youd like on the company.

 

[b-radical]

@karz4life, what is the name of that company in CO that sells bumper covers, is that the right name? what do you call those damn thing?

 

[karz4life87]

yes thats the right name of the company. and yes they are called bumper covers.

 

[b-radical]

why do you say the intake itself is a waste of money?

 

[KaiserMitsu]

Its called Cert-I-Fit Auto body Parts. I have bought several pieces from them over the years and never had a problem with fitment. Jimmeh shoo me a PM and can give you specifics if youd like on the company.

Yeah I have used this same company for many bumpers for my Eclipse, Damn snow keeps ripping them off :lol:, but there fitment is always spot on.

 

[karz4life87]

Yeah I have used this same company for many bumpers for my Eclipse, Damn snow keeps ripping them off :lol:, but there fitment is always spot on.

rofl kaiser i remember those good old days. good times. when your in town we might have to go pick up my SS bumper

 

[KaiserMitsu]

Lol seems like you are going to be putting me to alot of work when I get there!

 

[karz4life87]

of course there kaiser what kind of a weekend be if we didnt have somthing fun to do. haha we got quite a bit of things to do to. lol